SMC Heads-Up: Eruption! Fracking briefing, brain injury...

Tongariro eruption:
take twoAll eyes were on Mt Tongoriro
this week following the second eruption this year from the
North Island volcano.Tongariro's Te Maari
crater erupted just before 1.30pm on Wednesday afternoon,
sending a plume of ash and steam 4km into the the
air.

Prior to 2012 the crater had been dormant for over a
century.

Currently, volcanic activity remains low, but
substantial amounts of gas are sill still being emitted from
the crater. GNS Science plans to undertake monitoring
flights to sample gas around the volcano as soon as
conditions become favourable.

Interestingly, GNS noted
that a number of subsequent disruptions picked up on their
monitoring network were not seismic activity but in fact
lightening strikes from the
thunderstorm the affected much of the North Island on
Thursday night.A larger eruption in August spread ash
across the Central North Island and led to travel warnings
on major highways in the region.

Ruapehu link
doubted

Meanwhile, rumblings beneath the nearby
Mt Ruapehu volcano have scientists concerned another
eruption could occur there.Results
from the analysis of the crater lake samples taken on
Wednesday suggest that the level of activity at Ruapehu
hasn't changed since last week.

There are
still indications of volcanic unrest, and despite Ruapehu
being quiet at the moment, an eruption could occur with
little or no warning.

Speculation that the activity
and Tongariro and Ruapehu are linked has ben addressed by
experts in the media. "We don't have evidence at the moment
that the activity of the two volcanoes are related," GNS
volcanogist Nico Fournier told Stuff.co.nz. "But we can't
exclude it entirely."

BRIEFING: Fracking
report dueNext week will see the
release of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the
Environment's interim report on hydraulic fracturing in New
Zealand.This report will
cover the background, environmental risks, current oversight
and future implications of the use of unconventional
techniques in oil and gas production in New Zealand.

The Science Media Centre in conjunction with
Commissioner Dr Jan Wright, will be hosting a media briefing
where the details of the report will be explained. The
briefing will be held at 12pm on Tuesday, the 27th
of November (under embargo until 2pm on Tuesday) at
the Rerserve Bank building in Wellington.

Registration is essential - journalists signed up with
the SMC have received invitations. Contact the SMC for
further information.

An embargoed copy of the full
report will be available for download from the SMC Resource Library from 12
noon on the day of the briefing. The SMC is rounding up
comment from scientists on the report, which will also be
released on Tuesday morning.Brain injury rates
underestimatedWorldwide incidence of
traumatic brain injury could be six times higher than
previous estimates, according to new research based on a New
Zealand sample.

The BIONIC (Brain Injury Outcomes
New Zealand In the Community) study examined multiple
overlapping sources of information (eg, public hospitals,
family doctors, rehabilitation centres, coroner/autopsy
records, rest homes, ambulance services, and prisons) to
record all new cases of TBI that occurred over a one-year
period in the Waikato region, an area representative of the
New Zealand population in terms of demographic, ethnic,
socioeconomic, and urban and rural structure.

The
study was published in leading
international medical journal the Lancet this
week.

Lead researcher Professor Valery Feigin of AUT
highlighted the global significance of the research, saying,
"it is the first study to show that 95% of all TBI cases are
mild and that the true annual incidence of mild TBI is
substantially higher than recent World Health Organisation
(WHO) estimates (100-300/100 000 people per year).

"Based on these findings, we estimate that some 54-60
million people worldwide sustain a TBI each year, of which
some 2.2-3.6 million people incur moderate or severe TBI.
This is almost six times higher than previous estimates and
means that every second two people in the world are struck
by a new TBI."

More information on the
study, including a breakdown of NZ statistics, can be found
in an AUT media release, and a round up of
news coverage is available on the SMC website.

Quoted: Dominion Post"People routinely
tell untruths. In fact, it has been suggested that, in large
representative samples, so many people admit to regularly
fibbing that those who say they never tell a lie are, well,
lying."Professor Marc Wilson,
Victoria University, on a survey of lying in Generation Y
respondents.

SMC
summer internship on offerThe Science
Media Centre is looking for a summer intern / volunteer to
lend a hand with day-to-day operations of the centre.

The successful candidate will join a
fast-paced, savvy editorial team finding unexpected angles
on science stories for the media and tracking down experts
who can offer an evidence-based steer on breaking news and
controversial topics.

You'll need to
be:• a confident, skilled and snappy
writer• interested in science, environment, health,
tech, ag and other research-driven
topics• solidly-skilled in website content management;
reliable and highly self-motivated • available to help
out in our central Wellington office for a minimum of 15
hours a week in Jan-Feb 2013. For more information,
contact Dacia Herbulock at the Science Media Centre on 04
499 5476. To apply, please send an expression of interest and
CV with "SMC summer internship" in the subject
line, no later than 3 Dec 2013.More
information about this opportunity can be found here.On the science
radar...Town birds tweet a different tune, postulated Killer robot prohibition, Thanksgiving
turkey science, visualising carbon emissions and yawning fetuses.
Sciblogs: An ecologist's perspective
Sciblogs has a new contributor with
Victoria University's Dr Wayne Linklater joining the science
blogging stable.Dr
Linklater's blog Polit-ecol Science will look at
New Zealand's ecological issues and where they intersect
with politics.

Ecological science is at the heart of
tackling our "most wicked problems", argues Dr Linklater
in his maiden post. He calls
for an effort to "synthesize" expertise and knowledge to
find ways to better protect and manage the environment.

"We could make major advances in how knowledge and
research contributes to New Zealand and the quality of lives
of Kiwis if we could put all the human endeavours in one
room towards solutions to our most important problems or
highest aspirations as a country," he writes.

Dr
Linklater joins nearly 30 scientists and science writers on
Sciblogs, Australasia's largest science blogging network.
Awards recognise top scientists
The New Zealand Research Honours
Dinner, an annual awards evening celebrating top New Zealand
researchers, was held in Auckland this week.

A
world leading researcher in synthetic organic chemistry,
Prof Brimble's a specific focus is in the design of
synthetic analogues of naturally occurring molecules
produced by the brain in response to injury.

Prof Brimble
was awarded the highest honour in science, the Rutherford Medal, for
exceptional contributions to the advancement and promotion
of public awareness, knowledge and understanding in addition
to eminent research or technological practice.

The
recognition of Prof Brimble's work did not end there. She
also received the MacDiarmid Medal for
outstanding scientific research that could have large human
benefit and the Hector Medal for excellence in
chemical sciences.Science outreach recognised

The Callaghan Medal 'for
outstanding contribution to science communication' was
awarded to Professor Shaun Hendy (Victoria University
Wellington and Industrial Research Limited) and Sciblogs
contributor for his outstanding work in raising public
awareness of science and its role in increasing economic
prosperity.

The Science Media Centre congratulates
all the researchers receiving awards at the event. A full
list of recipients can be found here.

CONGRATULATIONS also to Neville Jordan,
entrepreneur, investor and the former President of the Royal
Society, who was last night named Wellingtonian of the
year.

Royal Society
Awards: The Annual Research Honours Dinner
paid tribute to NZ's top
researchers this week.

Diabetes wake up call:
Writing in the ODT, Prof Jim Mann chastises authorities for lack
of engagement on diabetes in NZ.

Sciblogs highlights

Some of the highlights from this week's
posts:

Sciblogs is pleased to welcome new
Sciblogger Prof Wayne Linklater from Victoria University to
the network. Prof Linklater's blog, Polit-ecol
Science,

Type I and Type II Errors -
Reporters have a much easier time finding people who've died
due to bad drugs than finding those who have been saved
because a good drug was approved more quickly, writes Eric
Crampton.Dismal Science

Seeing circular polarization -
Marcus Wilson awards the title of 'coolest eyesight
mechanism' to the mantis shrimp and its unusual ability to
dectect some of the more obscure properties of light waves.
Physics Stop

Please note: hyperlinks point, where possible,
to the relevant abstract or paper.

The heartache of the jobless:
Unemployment, multiple job losses and short periods without
work may be associated with increased risk for acute
myocardial infarction (AMI; heart attack), according to
study of 13,451 older Americans. In fact, the more jobs an
individual lost in their lifetime, the more likely that
heart attack became. The authors said, as a risk factor,
multiple job loss was comparable to smoking, diabetes and
hypertension.JAMA

Breast cancer and
jobs: Is there a link between the risk of breast
cancer and the working environment? Canadian researchers
attempted to address this question by comparing breast
cancer cases with randomly selected and matched community
controls. The authors found that women in jobs with
potentially high exposures to carcinogens and endocrine
disrupters (including agriculture and metal-working) had an
elevated breast cancer risk. Environmental
Health

Old new species:
New species can literally spend decades on the shelf before
being noticed. A review of newly described species has
revealed an interesting fact: most 'new' specimens aren't
actually that new - the average time between specimen
collection and official description is 20 years! The authors
of the research note the slow process can be due to a lack
of expertise in a field or the collection of multiple
specimens for confirmation.Current
Biology

'Obese but happy
gene': A gene variant which predisposes people to
obesity is also linked with a decrease in the risk of
depression, according to new research. A study which
analysed 17,200 DNA samples from participants in 21
countries found that the obesity promoting version of a gene
called FTO was also associated with an eight percent drop in
depression incidence. The discovery challenges the common
perception of a reciprocal link between depression and
obesity.Molecular
Psychiatry

Weak teens die
sooner: Low muscle strength in adolescence is
strongly associated with a greater risk of early death from
several major causes, particularly cardiovascular disease,
according to a Swedish study of one million male
adolescents. The effect is similar to well established risk
factors for early death like being overweight or having high
blood pressure, leading the authors to call for young
people, particularly those with very low strength, to engage
in regular physical activity to boost their muscular
fitness.BMJ

Policy
updates

Some of the policy
highlights from this week:MPI Consultation: The Ministry
for Primary Industries is seeking public views on
possible changes to the Horticulture Export Authority (HEA)
Act. Submission close 15 February
2013.

Rocket Lab has signed a Commercial Space Launch Act Agreement with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The agreement enables Rocket Lab to use NASA resources - including personnel, facilities and equipment - for launch and reentry efforts. More>>

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